There are many occasions when people purchase gifts jointly rather than separately. Such purchases are often made for birthdays, weddings and engagements, mothers' and fathers' days, retirements, leavings and goings away, bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs etc.
The motivations for making such purchases are numerous. For example, by joining their individual donations, the participants can afford a more expensive gift than they would be able to afford separately. There are also times when individuals regard the act of contributing to a joint gift as being appropriate or desirable in itself. For example, all of the children in a family might want to give their parents a joint anniversary gift, or all of the members of a sporting team might want to give a departing member a gift from the entire team. The co-operation exhibited can signify the connection between the gift givers and their relationship with the recipient. Another motivation held by people participating in a joint gift is convenience. It is often more convenient for a group of six people to organise one gift between them rather than six gifts separately. Often, people giving joint gifts will have more than one motive behind their actions.
3. Traditional Joint Purchasing
Traditionally, group gifts are bought when group members physically travel to a store where they choose, pay for, and pick up the item.
However, people frequently encounter problems when buying joint gifts in this manner. Depending upon the particular circumstances:                it may be difficult or impossible to get people together to coordinate the purchase (due to them living or working far apart or leading busy lives);        not everyone has a say in selecting the goods or services;        a minority of the group has the burden of choosing and collecting the gift;        the person who pays the supplier may encounter difficulties in being reimbursed, perhaps recovering payment late (possibly incurring interest charges) or not at all;        some people ultimately pay too much or too little; and        the person who pays the supplier obtains all of the rewards program points associated with the payment, while the others receive none.        
When group gifts are organised using traditional methods, vendors miss out on valuable information that can assist their businesses. In most instances, there is no way for the retailer to know that the purchase is a gift, or to identify the recipient or the other people involved in the purchase of the gift. There is no way for the retailer to turn these absent parties into customers.
1. Electronic commerce prior art
The relevant prior art can be divided into three groups: demand aggregation systems, person-to-person (P2P) payment systems and donation accumulation systems.
a) Demand aggregation systems
An example of a demand aggregation system is described in Patent Publication Number WO00/45318, “Aggregating on-line purchase requests”. This system aggregates demand for particular products so that multiple “low volume” purchasers can take advantage of high volume discounts. It operates in accordance with a “buy cycle”, which is constituted by:                a server posting a web page containing an offer describing a product and listing prices for various quantities of that product;        the acceptance and aggregation of multiple purchase orders from a plurality of purchasers; and        the closing of the offer in accordance with pre-established criteria, generally with the aim of maximising the quantity sold and minimising the unit price.        
This system is designed to lower the unit price that can be obtained by the purchasers, and to increase the vendor's ability to attract large volume orders. This is a common feature of all demand aggregation systems. However, such systems are of little or no relevance to individuals wishing to purchase a joint gift. First, they do not facilitate the purchase of a single item or a small volume of items by a group of purchasers, as they are concerned with the aggregation of multiple purchase orders rather than the accumulation of the contributions from a plurality of purchasers to create a single, indivisible purchase order. Secondly, the minimization of the unit price is rarely the primary motive for buying a group gift. It can be seen that the present invention does not operate in accordance with a “buy cycle” as defined in Patent Publication No. WO 00/45318, or in accordance with other demand aggregation systems.
b) P2P Payment Systems
The prior art also discloses a number of systems—known as Person-To-Person or P2P Payment Systems—that utilise the Internet to enable payments between individuals. One such system can be found at www.paypal.com. In order to make a payment using this system, a person (the donor) becomes a member by setting up a Paypal account. This account is linked to a private bank or credit card account. The donor sends an email to his or her friend (the recipient), stating that the sum can be collected from the Paypal site. When the recipient visits this web site, he or she becomes a member (if not already a member), and can then accepts the transfer of the money. The Paypal system administers the transfer of the funds between the linked bank or credit card accounts of the donor and the recipient. Similar systems may be found at www.c2it.com, and paydirect.com.
Such systems can be used to organize group gifts. One group member can purchase the item, and can then ask the other members to pay for their respective shares by using one or more P2P payment systems. This means it is not necessary for the gift givers to get together in order to exchange their payments. Further, by using Internet services such as the World Wide Web and e-mail, the gift givers can each have a say in the choice of the gift, and it can be delivered to one of the group or directly to the recipient. Lastly, it is possible for more than one of the joint purchasers to obtain the rewards points associated with the use of credit card or other electronic payment systems.
Nevertheless, when used to coordinate the payments for group gifts, these services invariably involve a number of disadvantages for the joint purchasers. For example:                as with traditional methods, the person who pays the supplier may encounter difficulties in being reimbursed by the others;        it is still possible that some people will pay the wrong amount;        the joint purchasers are usually required to become members of the various P2P Payment Systems before they can make or receive payments (which may involve cost and inconvenience);        the systems require the completion of at least two distinct stages: the purchase of the gift from the vendor, and the payments between the joint purchasers; and        the systems usually require one of the joint purchasers to keep track of the payments between the group members.        
The use of P2P Payment systems by customers does not solve any of the disadvantages for the retailers, who still have no systematic way of knowing that the purchase is a gift, or the identity of the people involved in the purchase of the gift. Again, there is no way for the retailer to turn these absent parties into customers.
c) Donation Accumulation Systems
The last group of prior art systems can be referred to as donation accumulation systems. These systems use computers to register and accumulate the offers of joint purchasers, and to effect a purchase. Unlike demand aggregation systems, donation accumulation systems function in low-volume as opposed to high volume purchasing environments.
The first such system is one described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,794,219, entitled “Method of conducting an on-line auction with bid, pooling”. This patent describes a method of accumulating bids from multiple members of an auction consortium during a bidding session at an on-line auction. A central computer coordinates the registration of bidding groups, and then combines the bids from the individuals in the consortium. Traditionally, bidders in an auction can only win if they can personally secure sufficient funds to cover a winning bid. The method described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,794,219 overcomes this disadvantage by allowing the accumulation of smaller funds.
Unfortunately, this system is of limited application to joint gift givers, as appropriate gifts are not often offered for sale at auction. Gifts are usually purchased in a retail rather than an auction environment. In retail sales, the price is generally set by the vendor and is usually not negotiable, whereas in an auction environment, the price is largely determined by the highest bidding purchaser. The system described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,794,219 does not describe how to accumulate the individual contributions where the price is set. In such circumstances, it is desirable for the system to ensure that the total contributions of the joint purchasers does not exceed the price of the item, and that the joint purchasers are satisfied with the relative sizes of their individual contributions.
The second system in this category is described in International Patent Publication No. WO 01/29787, entitled “System and Method for Accumulating Individual Gifts to Create a Group Gift”, by Giftcertificates.com, Inc, and is considered to be the closest prior art to the present invention. This document describes a system for automating the task of accumulating a group gift to be donated to a recipient where the item purchased is a gift certificate, electronic voucher, or negotiable instrument such as a bank cheque. The system works when a person, referred to as the promoter, accesses a software application via a network to initiate a “gift campaign”. A gift campaign is defined as the task of contacting a group of participants for the purpose of soliciting donations or contributions to a group gift for the benefit of a recipient.
The promoter identifies potential participants by an e-mail address and optionally identifies a number of factors, including: the reason for the gift campaign (e.g. birthday); a suggested individual donation amount; and a total gift goal.
Finally, the promoter must identify a triggering event that will be used to terminate the gift campaign. It is explained that the triggering event may be a particular date or time at which the gift campaign will terminate, or it may be another event such as the reaching of an aggregate gift amount. The software application then contacts each of the identified participants by e-mail.
The participants can respond by clicking on a Universal Resource Locator (URL), which prompts the software application to make a donation page available to them. The donation page is described as including a field to allow the participant to input the amount of the individual donation. This field is described as taking the form of a drop-down menu having several discrete donation amounts. The donation page also includes a field designed to accept credit card information from the participant.
It is explained that a triggering event terminates the gift campaign and the service provider creates a gift certificate for presentation to the recipient. One of the embodiments explained involves the issue of a digital certificate that may be spent by the recipient at any of several online vendors who have a business relationship with the provider using the system described.
The Giftcertificates.com system addresses certain problems associated with traditional forms of joint purchasing. It avoids the need for the participants to get together to coordinate the purchase, and alleviates the need for one person to make a payment on behalf of the group, thereby preventing reimbursement problems.
Unfortunately, the system still presents a number of disadvantages for those interested in making joint purchases to give as gifts. The chief of these is that it does not provide a way to administer the joint purchase of a specific gift (as opposed to a gift certificate). While gift certificates offer the advantage of the recipient being able to choose a gift that he or she would like, they have the disadvantage of being considered by some to be a less personal and less thoughtful gift. According to a survey by Forrester Research entitled “The Hidden Value in Gift Sales” (Carrie A. Johnson, May 2001) only 5% of shoppers have bought a gift certificate online. 27% of consumers have not purchased a gift certificate online because they don't give gift certificates in general.
It would be possible for consumers to contribute funds towards a gift certificate and then to choose a specific gift with the money raised. However this would be a two-stage process, which is somewhat inconvenient.
The purchase of gift certificates is similar to purchase at auctions in that the price is not set by the vendor. It is determined by adding up the individual contributions. As discussed above, where the price is set, joint purchasers of gifts have an interest in ensuring that no surplus funds are paid to the vendor. Therefore it is desirable for the computer system to coordinate the contributions so that they add up to the price of the chosen items. Where a gift certificate is chosen, the total amount of the gift is not crucial to the sale. A gift certificate for the accumulated amount can be issued whenever the nominated time expires. Further if the triggering event is a total amount, it does not matter if the combined total of the contributions has exceeded this amount, because the excess goes to the recipient, who can spend it on the gift. Where a specific gift is subsequently chosen by the gift recipient when redeeming the gift certificate, any contributions made in excess of the price of the item purchased must be disposed of in some way. Conversely, where a specific gift is being purchased jointly, there must be a way of dealing with contributions made by participants when the price of the items has not been reached. For example, if a gift costs $100, but the gift campaign fails because only $80 can be raised from amongst the joint purchasers, there must be a way of refunding the $80 to the relevant people, or of ensuring there has been no transfer in these circumstances. Unfortunately, the system described in Patent Publication No. WO 01/29787 does not address such problems.
Often the purchasers have an interest, not just in completing the purchase, but also in ensuring they are satisfied with the relative sizes of their individual contributions. Joint purchasers may want to pay equal portions. Alternatively, some people may want to pay a higher portion than others, perhaps due to having a closer relationship with the gift recipient, or more funds to contribute. The Giftcertificates.com system does not provide a mechanism for assisting the purchasers in this way.
The reference to any prior art in this specification is not, and should not be taken as, an acknowledgment or any form of suggestion that that prior art forms part of the common general knowledge in Australia.